Cherchez le Docteur
by Winnywriter
Summary: During her search for the Doctor, Donna Noble finds herself in Paris. Against all odds, she finds the Time Lord there. An early version, anyway. The Ninth version. But when they're being attacked by aliens she can't afford to be picky. Collab story.
1. Chapter 1

**This is a collab story that grew from a single comment on a forum to a multi-chapter adventure. It's written with the help of the marvelous Time Lords and Ladies over at the Official Time Lord Registry. This story is dedicated to the memory of their email inboxes. :P**

**If you like, please leave a review on your way out. All of us over at the Registry would really appreciate it. ^^**

**_Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who. The credit for the ideas in this story is shared by myself and my fellow Whovians on the forum._**

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><p><em> Chapter One<em>

Spain had been a waste of time. Well, maybe not a _complete_ waste of time, she had to admit, since the scuba diving had been amazing, but the point was that she hadn't been able to find what she had been looking for.

The blue box had been nowhere in sight.

She supposed that getting her hopes up had been reckless on her part. After all, what were the chances that her winning a round-trip ticket to Spain would coincide with a sighting of a tall, skinny time-travelling alien man? Slim, she guessed. Very slim. Still, she hadn't been able to avoid a tiny glimmer of hope that had welled up within her.

Maybe she'd hoped fate would intervene. In the end, it hadn't. And she was on her way home to no job, no husband and no spaceman.

She didn't realize how exhausted she was until she collapsed into the seat on the airplane next to a quiet man who smelled vaguely of garlic and began to fall asleep.

What she didn't know as she snored through the airline safety regulations presentation was that, on the other side of the airport, a twenty-seven year old woman had just boarded a plane heading to England. Her intended destination, however, was Paris, and the ticket in her hand had been intended for one Donna Noble. That same Donna Noble, in fact, who had in her possession the ticket that should have been in the hands of the twenty-seven year old French woman.

"We'll be touching down in Paris, France in about two hours."

The words were still echoing in her head as a cascade of French and English words poured over her, none of them registering in her mind.

Paris.

_Paris._

That hadn't been part of her travel plans. Not that she had any qualms about going to France, but she could have sworn that he itinerary had dictated that she go _home _today. She waved down a passing flight attendant.

"Excuse me," she said, eyebrows furrowing in confusion and a slight nagging sense of worry. "But...did he just say 'Paris'?" The flight attendant let out a polite chuckle.

"Of course he did," she said. "Is there some sort of problem?"

"No, I just...well actually yeah...See, I'm supposed to be going to England." She was trying to keep her tone amiable, but it was difficult considering the flight attendant's constant plastic-looking smile was beginning to grate on her nerves the same way that waiters wearing vests covered in colorful buttons did.

"This plane is headed for Paris, France. If you wanted to go to England then you should have bought an airline ticket that took you there." Donna huffed. Of course she would manage to find the flight attendant who not only had a sickly sweet painted on smile, but also had a taste for sarcasm. She was tempted to think of a smart comeback, but her need to get answers and resolve her worry won over in the end.

"I did have a ticket to go to England. I do."

"Ma'am, you'll just have to take it up with the airline when we land." The woman began to walk away down the aisle, but Donna felt her temper flare, and she stood up.

"Hold on one sodding second!" she called. The flight attendant turned with a badly-obscured roll of her eyes. "I want to talk to someone else, you hear me? Someone who can actually do something useful!"

"Ma'am, please take your seat." People were staring, looking uneasy. Donna didn't much care.

"I won't take my seat! I'm on a plane heading in the _wrong direction!_"

"Unless you expect us to turn the plane around-"

"Well why the bloody hell can't you? You can steer this thing, right?"

"Ma'am, take your seat!" The flight attendant's voice was stern and left no room for negotiations. Donna huffed and sat down slowly, feeling the eyes of the other passengers begin to wander away from her.

"Wrong bloody plane..." she muttered as she watched the flight attendant stalk down the aisle. "Put me on the wrong bloody plane...What am I supposed to do, eh? Just spend an impromptu weekend in Paris? They'll be paying for my ticket home if it's the last thing I do..." She turned to the man sitting next to her, who was looking at her strangely, somewhat cautiously, as if she had a bomb on her that could explode if he glanced at her the wrong way.

"What are you looking at?" she spat. He quickly turned back to his magazine.

Donna sat up and glanced down the aisle again, but the flight attendant had disappeared. Just as well, she thought. Though she was going to make sure to flag her down again the next time she passed. The least she could do was make herself useful and get her a drink. Something strong.

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><p>"So where are you headed, mate?" Donna slurred about an hour later to the less-than-pleased man who was sitting beside her trying to concentrate on his magazine. His face twisted into a scowl and he buried his nose deeper into the pages, as if the fend away the strong scent of alcohol on her breath.<p>

"Oi, I asked you a question!" The man sighed.

"Paris," he said tersely in a thick French accent.

"Well I was headed to London...or at least I was _supposed _to be headed to London. But _somebody_-" She pushed herself up out of the seat and shot a very poignant glare at the flight attendant down the row. "put me on the wrong bloody plane, and now I'm headed to _Pehr-eez_ too."

The man huffed and ignored her. Donna carried on without batting an eye.

"Guess it's not all bad. I mean who doesn't want to go to Paris, right? And at least I remember some of my high school French classes, am I right?"

"You speak French?" asked the man, somewhat disbelievingly.

"_Bee-ahn sewer, jay parlay frahn-sez!_" Donna replied, cackling as she did and taking another hardy sip of her drink. The Frenchman recoiled as if he'd just noticed some intolerable odor and tried to turn away from her.

"_Jay mah-pellay Donna Noble._"

"Ma'am?" asked the flight attendant as she came swishing down the aisle, placing a hand on Donna's shoulder. "If you could keep your voice down..."

"Maybe I could if I hadn't been put on the wrong bloody plane, missy!" The flight attendant's expression turned sour.

"Ma'am, you're disturbing the other passengers. If you don't calm down-"

"What are you gonna do? Stuff me in the overhead luggage compartment?"

"Ma'am, please-"

Donna turned to the man sitting next to her and asked, very loudly, "Oi, how do you say 'Piss off' in French?"

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><p>A few hours later, Donna found herself in a small cafe, alone at a table next to a large bay window. Through it she could see people milling about, smiling, laughing, talking as they strolled past. She ignored them and chewed on a piece of warm bread. The basket before her was nearly empty. It was her second basket, in fact.<p>

A waiter approached her, and before a single word could come out of his mouth, she spat, "Still thinkin'!" and watched him leave with a roll of his eyes as she went back to her bread.

She was in some kind of sticky situation for sure. She'd managed not to get herself arrested, but she'd been barred from getting another plane home, "grounded for belligerent behavior," they'd said. Just peachy. Now she was stuck in Paris with a suitcase full of mostly dirty laundry and no way to get back to England.

Stranded in Paris. Stranded in a French cafe with her stomach twisting around free bread.

She hadn't ordered anything besides water yet partially because the alcohol was starting to work its way out of her system and was making her slightly queasy, partially because she was too annoyed to eat anything substantial, and partially because she didn't have extra money to be throwing around on expensive French cuisine.

Everyone had called her daft for spending her time searching for aliens. Well, not aliens. Just one in particular.

And what had it gotten her? A one-way ticket to France, when all she wanted was to be at home where she could afford the food and understand what people were saying. Most of the time anyway.

Huffing angrily, she looked over at the table opposite her. The couple there smiled as the waiter placed a plate of what she assumed was escargot before them. It looked revolting, and she crinkled her nose, ignoring their irksome glance in her direction as she did so. As they ate, she continued to stare, her gaze becoming more and more sour as she did. The little buggers on the plate seemed to slither and writhe as they consumed them, and Donna wasn't sure if it was the slight alcohol-induced fog that still hung around her mind causing it to play tricks on her or not. Either way, it was sickening, she she had to look away before it made her ill.

At least she tried.

But then one of them, apparently not as dead as Donna had hoped, opened its mouth, revealed a set of sparkling white, razor sharp teeth, and bit the woman's finger.

She screamed, and the entire restaurant turned to look and see what had occurred, and just as they did, while Donna watched in horror and disgust, the snail began to twist and swell, growing to gargantuan proportions until it was a huge squirming creature that stood nearly seven feet tall.

The cafe erupted into chaos as screams and the sound of pounding feet mixed with the creature's sickening gurgling. Even in her dazed state, Donna wasn't one to waste time; she bolted from the restaurant and sprinted down the street, breaking from the crowd to turn down a back alley.

Just as she looked back to make sure none of those horrendous things were following her, she plowed into something large and very solid, and fell to the ground. Her vision was a bit blurred as she looked up, but that shape and that shade of blue were unmistakable.

It was the Tardis.


	2. Chapter 2

_Chapter Two_

It was all Donna could do not to almost cry with happiness at the sight of the great blue box. It seemed...tired, somehow, like the wood was sagging and warping, albeit very subtly. And the outside looked singed, the paint peeling in places, cracks were clearly visible on the doors. No matter, she didn't have the time to focus on appearances. Not when she could hear the terrified screams of the people running for their lives not far behind her.

She banged on the door. "Oi! Spaceman!" There was no reply. "Martian!" Still, no reply. She sighed. Fine. "Doctor!"

There were sounds of someone shuffling around inside for a few moments, frustrated groans and coughs and few strange-sounding noises that she though might be alien curses, knowing him. Finally, the door began to creak open, slowly, almost painfully so, and Donna craned her neck to try and see inside.

Smoke billowed out from within the ship, shielding the figure slouched in the doorway from view. She coughed and waved her hands in an attempt to clear it, her eyes watering from the noxious fumes. Finally, he stepped out.

He was tall and harsh-looking, his facial features sharp and his eyes dark. He was bulkier than the Doctor she knew - more muscular with broader shoulders. He was dressed in an odd formal outfit that seemed to be taken straight out of a picture book about Victorian-era England. The fabric was torn and singed, though, and it fit him awkwardly; it was too tight in some places like his chest and arms and too loose in others. He stumbled, leaning against the door frame of the TARDIS, looking up at her with bright, shining, vibrant blue eyes that seemed to hold an endless amount of fury and sadness all at once.

"Who are you?" she asked after a moment's pause. If he heard her, he chose to ignore her question, looking around inquiringly.

"Where am I?" he wondered.

"I asked first," Donna countered. "Who are you?" Finally, he seemed to come back into focus, his gaze snapping toward her so quickly it made her jump.

"I'm the Doctor," he said plainly.

"No you're not." He furrowed his brow at her.

"Course I am!"

"No you're not!" Donna insisted. "I know the Doctor. I've seen him. He's a skinny streak of alien nothing, and you...Your face is all wrong, and your ears- Blimey, your _ears!_ You could travel through time and space with just those things! Don't even need the space ship!" His hands shot up to his ears as she criticized them. She reached up and poked his cheek with one finger.

"If you're really the Doctor, did you have some kind of plastic surgery? Must've gone horribly wrong if you ask me-"

His expression suddenly turned hard, and he swatted her hand away, turning away from her.

"I don't have time for this," he growled. As he moved to shut the doors and leave her, before she got the chance to try and stop him, a terrified scream pierced the air, and both of them whirled around to search for the source.

The self-proclaimed Doctor took a step toward the sound, but stumbled again, his legs feeling weak, and he fell to the ground. Donna knelt beside him.

"Are you alright, mate?" she asked. He clutched his chest and looked up, a wisp of golden light escaping from between his lips. Donna put a hand on his shoulder, but he pushed her away.

"Fine," he said, though his voice was hoarse. He hoisted himself up and staggered toward the source of the noise.

"Something's going very bad here," he said to himself.

"Thanks for pointing out the obvious," Donna mumbled. He rolled his eyes and faced her, looking at her expectantly. She put her hands up in a defensive motion. "I don't know what's going on. I was just sitting around, mindin' my own business when out of nowhere some woman's plate of escargot goes bad! And I don't mean it spoiled. I mean it grew teeth and made a snack out of her finger-"

Just then, one of the creatures came into view. Its body was huge and slimy, its teeth gleaming in the light as it barred them and let out a horrid, gurgling growl. Its eye stalks turned toward them and it began to slither in their direction with alarming speed; Donna had never seen a snail move at such a quick pace.

"Into the TARDIS!" the Doctor yelled, yanking her by the arm and pulling her with him. "Now! Go!" She didn't need to be told twice; she followed him to the blue box. Its doors were shut, smoke still spilling out from within. He pulled on them, but they wouldn't budge.

"No...NO! Why now?"

"What's going on?" Donna asked, casting a glance toward the hulking beast that was still charging at them.

"It's still rebuilding, still repairing itself. We can't get in!"

"Well _do_ something!" Donna yelled. "_Doctor!"_

He looked at her, grabbed her hand and said one word: "_RUN!_"

And they did just that. They ran down the alley, Donna letting out a scream as he pulled her past the slobbering beast, its teeth narrowly missing them. They wound up in the street; people still ran by, screaming and fleeing for their lives from the monsters that were terrorizing the restaurant.

They rounded the corner, and suddenly they were faced with a horrifying sight: four of the creatures, slobbering and growling, were bulldozing their way through the restaurant. People screamed and ran, some threw things at the beasts from a distance, and a few brave (or perhaps reckless) souls attacked them with whatever they could find. One man wielded a chair against one of the slimy monstrosities, but it chomped through the wood without any difficulty, and the man was forced to run for his life, narrowly escaping the sharp, knife-like teeth of the resurrected mollusk.

"What are those things?" Donna asked breathlessly.

"Snails," the Doctor plainly replied. "Reanimated and mutated to grotesque size, but still just your basic Earth snail."

"Those _things_ jumped off of a woman's _plate_, and you're acting like it's just another day!" He didn't answer her; it seemed as if he hadn't even heard her as he bolted away, running toward the restaurant.

"Stay there!" he commanded over one shoulder. "Keep safe!"

"Oi! Don't you just run off and leave me-" But it was too late; he had already disappeared inside the cafe. She huffed angrily. "Fine," she mumbled, crossing her arms over her chest. "I'll just stay here in the middle of a hysterical crowd and wait for you to get back, you bloody spaceman..."

Something growled behind her, and her heart slammed against her sternum as she turned to see the gleaming, dripping teeth of one of the beasts mere inches from her face.

"DOCTOR!" she cried, and she immediately sprinted after him.

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><p>The restaurant was destroyed on the inside; only the basic structure of the building remained. The rest was torn to bits, pieces of things that had once been furniture and table cloths and counter tops littered the place. There were five of the creatures in total, all of them slobbering over the food they seemed to have found in what remained of the kitchen. Thankfully, the beasts seemed more interested in satisfying their appetites than chasing after innocent restaurant patrons.<p>

He stepped forward, and a piece of glass cracked beneath his heel. The creatures looked up rather sluggishly and growled as they noticed him. They began to slither toward him.

After just a moment's surprise, the Doctor grinned.

"Been hitting the bottle rather hard, have you?" he quipped, nodding at the pile of shattered wine bottles that had spilled their contents all over the floor, most of which the snails seemed to have slurped up themselves. His suspicions were confirmed when he saw the way they unsteadily moved toward him, slow and groggy, not quite able to haul themselves forward in a straight line.

The closest one lunged, but it missed by a mile, and he jumped to the side, putting a cracked half of a table between him and the creature. He saw just what he'd been looking for on the floor just a few feet away and he grabbed it, dodging another poorly aimed assault by one of the monsters.

"I never liked escargot much, me." he said as he hopped up on the counter top. "Was never really fond of the taste. Still...nothing a little pinch of salt can't fix, is it?" He tossed the ornate glass salt shaker in the air above the creatures, and in a quick, sweeping motion, he took out his sonic screwdriver and aimed it at the container in mid-air. It shattered magnificently, its contents spilling over the creatures' writhing bodies, and they screeched in agony, their forms dehydrating and deforming until they were just lumps of rubbery tissue, all dead.

Donna came careening around the corner a moment later, stopping in her tracks when she saw the carcasses of the beasts. "How did you..."

"Salt," he said with a grin. "Just a pinch of salt. Nothing to it. Still, it can't have hurt that they were drunk."

"Drunk...?"

"Oh, completely. It's that French wine, there. Strong stuff." He stepped over the shrivelled corpses of the monsters, but stumbled again, holding himself up against the counter top. He coughed, a swirling gold mist escaping from his mouth again. Donna watched it dissipate in the air.

"What is that?" she asked dubiously.

"Regeneration energy," he said, hoisting himself up. "I'm still overflowing with it."

"Not dangerous, is it?"

"Course not." He let out a breath and turned to face her. But just as he did, Donna caught a glimpse of something huge and hulking making its way down the street outside, coming toward them. Moments later, someone screamed. Neither of them had time to react before the beast, the largest of the creatures, smashed its way inside and just barely missed catching the Doctor in its razor sharp fangs.

"You missed one!" Donna yelled as the Doctor grabbed her by the arm and pulled her away from the beast.

"Yeah, I got that!" he replied. "Move!" They ran to the back of the restaurant, out the rear entrance. The beast was making an unholy ruckus as it forged a path of further destruction through the already demolished restaurant.

"Up here!" the Doctor commanded, pulling Donna toward a metal ladder that led up to the roof of the building. They grabbed on and climbed up as quickly as they could, hearing the monster rampaging below them.

Donna made the mistake of looking down when they were nearly to the top, and she saw the beast beginning to slither its way up the side of the restaurant after them.

"Doctor!" she cried in warning.

"Keep climbing!" he yelled back. She tore her eyes away from the creature and followed him up to the roof.

"Now what, genius?" Donna asked breathlessly when they reached the top and realized that there was nowhere else to go besides the way they came. And that way was being blocked at the moment by a giant slobbering mutant snail with very sharp teeth and an apparently ravenous appetite for the two of them.

"I know, I know..." he ground out, gritting his teeth as he clutched his head and tried to focus his thoughts; his mind was still so garbled, still spinning from regeneration, still aching with the memories of death and destruction that were so vivid, so painfully fresh that it physically _hurt _him to think about it.

"Well?" Donna prompted; the creature was nearly to the top, and she could hear it growling with hunger. "You're supposed to be the man with all the answers, aren't you? Do something!"

"_I know!_" the Doctor yelled. Think. He needed to think. He just needed a moment to _think_. But he didn't have a moment; that thing was just moments away, and they were cornered. He just needed to _think._

It came to him in one cascading torrent of creativity, and he found himself moving without conscious heed from his reeling mind. He picked up a shard of glass at his feet, climbing up on the ledge of the building, facing the creature that was slithering its way up the wall.

"What are you doing?" Donna asked.

"If this doesn't work," he called, staring the beast down, "You don't wait for me. You run, you understand?"

"What-" He didn't give her time to reply. He angled the glass in his hand toward the creature, ignoring the sharp edges cutting into his skin as he reflected the light from above, focusing it into a single beam and aiming it at the creature's eyes. It howled grotesquely, blinded by the bright light, and the Doctor took the opportunity and leaped from the ledge, landing on the creature and knocking it from the wall in its moment of disorientation.

Donna ran to the edge, looking down in alarm as a gut-wrenching thud echoed through the streets. The creature lay motionless on the ground below, the Doctor beside it. Donna rushed down the ladder as quickly as she could and knelt tentatively by his side; the creature appeared dead, the glass shard lodged in its hulking corpse.

"Doctor," she called, leaning next to him. She put a hand on its shoulder, and his blue eyes snapped open, making her jump. He sat up, taking a deep breath.

"I think you got it," Donna said after a moment, sounding rather dazed by the whole experience. The Doctor stared down at the creature's disgusting form, and he got a far-off look in his eye, like it brought on memories of something that caused him to become detached from the present for a few moments.

"Doctor..." she repeated. He didn't seem to hear her, so she leaned closer, and when she did, she saw sadness in his eyes, so vivid and crushing that it made her own heart ache just to see it reflected there. "Your hands..."

He snapped out of it, turning toward her finally. She gestured down at his hands; they were cut from the glass.

"It's nothing," he muttered, and his skin began to glow lightly, the same golden color of the wisps of regeneration energy he'd been exhaling before. The cuts healed right before her eyes, and he looked up at her with an expression that was hard and stern.

"You should go," he said.

"What are you talking about?"

"Go," he said, walking away from her and from the corpse of the dead beast. "Go home."

"What? Just like that?" She chased after him. "I came here looking for you!"

"A different me."

"But still you!" He paused, and she took the opportunity to catch up with him. "What happened?" she asked. "I know something happened to you. Just look at you! What's going on?" He turned to face her, and his expression was bordering on angry; the sight was enough to make Donna flinch.

"I told you," he said, his tone almost menacing, "Go home."

"No."

"No?"

"Yeah," she confirmed, crossing her arms. "It might not be something your used to hearing Mr. High and Mighty Doctor, but I'm telling you no. I spent a long time looking for you, and I don't care if you've got a different face then I'm used to, I'm not just going to let you leave."

He stood there a moment, staring at her.

"Now..." she breathed. "What's with these clothes? Did you get dressed in the dark or something? Or did you get lost on your way to a costume party?" He looked down at himself, seeming to realize for the first time what he was wearing; parts of the coat had ripped as they'd run and fought, and the trousers were awkwardly short.

"I was wearing them before..." he said cryptically.

"Before what?"

"Before I regenerated."

"You what now?"

"Changed my face. To save my own life. I barely escaped, but I was hurt...badly. I had to..." He began to drift off again, and Donna lowered her voice, squinting at him, somehow knowing that whatever he was talking about, whatever had caused him to change his appearance this way, it was bad. Very bad.

"Barely escaped what?"

He shook his head.

"It's nothing," he said. Donna rolled her eyes.

"Fine," she said. "If you want to be all dark and mysterious, be my guest. But you can't go gallivanting around Paris in that get-up. Come on." She took his arm this time, pulling him along with her down the street away from the destroyed restaurant, away from the grotesque corpses of the destroyed monsters.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thanks for all the reviews so far. I and everyone back on the forum really appreciate the feedback. :)**

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><p><em>Chapter Three<em>

"I don't exactly have time to go shopping now, you know," the Doctor pointed out as Donna perused the clothing racks.

"Well that ship of yours isn't going anywhere anytime soon, according to you, is it now? Besides, you can't go running around Paris like that, can you?"

"Paris..." he mused. "So we're in Paris..."

Donna quirked an eyebrow at him. "Course we're in Paris. How could you not know that?"

"Why would the TARDIS bring me here? What's so special about Paris, France?" He seemed to be musing to himself, but Donna decided to answer anyway.

"It's _Paris_, for crying out loud! City of lights, of love...Never meant to come here myself, mind you, but...well, it's a pretty beautiful place anyway. What size are you? Fourteen?"

"Will you stop it with the clothes?" he huffed irately. "We should be spending our time trying to figure out what caused those snails to mutate the way they did and how to keep it from happening again. More to the point, _I_ should be doing that. _You_ should be getting home-"

"Don't start with that again," Donna snapped, shoving a shirt and trousers into his hands and pushing him toward the dressing room. "You're not getting rid of me that easy. Besides, I can't get another plane for God knows how long, and I can't exactly take the bus back, can I?" She closed the dressing room door before he could argue and waited nearby for him to change. After a moment, she heard an annoyed sigh and the sounds of him getting out of his old, singed, ripped clothes.

"How do you know me? I've never met you before."

"You ruined my wedding day, you did," Donna said. "Still...ended up being for the better anyway. So maybe I should thank you?"

"But it's all wrong. You can't have met me yet. The Doctor you saw...what was he like?"

"You want me to tell you about yourself? That's a bit egotistical, don't you think?" He opened the door to glare at her in annoyance.

"Just describe him."

"Fine..." Donna sighed as he disappeared back inside. "Tall...skinny...rock-star hair. Annoyingly chipper, if you ask me. And..." She trailed off, remembering all of a sudden the darkness she'd seen in that man's eyes, the fury that had burned there as he'd destroyed the offspring of that horrid alien they'd faced beneath the city. She remembered the fire, the heat, the fear, and she thought of those vibrant blue eyes of the man in the dressing room beside her.

Suddenly, it wasn't so hard to believe that it really was the same man in there.

"Doesn't sound familiar," he said, snapping her out of her state of deep thought. "Must have been a future version. But when you met him, did he...I...know you?"

"Don't think so," Donna said.

"That's bad..."

"How so?" He opened the door again, staring at her intently.

"Because if you met a future version of me that didn't remember you, us meeting here now means I've caused a paradox. and that's dangerous. It's the last thing I need to deal with right now." He thrust the shirt she'd handed him before back into her hands harshly. "It's too small."

"How do you not know your own size?" she asked irately as she went to find something else.

"It's this new body. I don't know it yet."

"Fine," she said, handing him another shirt. "Try this." He rolled his eyes and disappeared into the dressing room again.

"So...a paradox...what would happen if we did cause one?"

"Could be anything," he said. "That's what's so dangerous. Could rip up the planet, or the whole galaxy if it was bad enough. Time is complicated like that."

"How complicated?"

"Very complicated." Donna crossed her arms and leaned against the wall when something caught her eye. She reached over and grabbed the leather jacket, opening the door to the dressing room and thrusting it into his arms.

"This should suit you," she said. "Dark and mysterious. Perfect for you."

* * *

><p>The Doctor stepped out a minute later, and Donna grinned.<p>

"I told you the jacket would be a nice touch," she said proudly. "Much better than that old period costume you had before, eh?"

"Now that you're satisfied," he said, his jaw set. "Can we get back to more important matters?"

"Probably a good idea..." Donna agreed. "It's getting late anyway." The Doctor paused a moment, and then his eyes widened as if he'd just noticed something incredibly significant that he'd missed before.

"How late?" he asked urgently.

"What? You got a date or something?"

"What time is it?"

"Uh..." She looked around for a clock, finding one on the opposite wall. "Going on nine o'clock. Blimey, is it really that late? Jet lag will be the death of me..."

"Nine o'clock?" the Doctor mused. "But how can it be..."

"What are you talking about? What's so important about the time anyway?"

"Look outside," he said. "Just look!" She did.

"Yeah? What's so important about what's happening out there? Just an ordinary day...besides the giant snails anyway."

"Exactly..._day!_" He rushed toward the window of the boutique, pointing outside. "It's _light_ outside. Bright as day, but it should be dark."

"What..." Donna strode over to the window as well. How could she not have noticed? He was right; it was as bright as midday out there. "Maybe the clock is wrong or something?"

"No...it's not. Can't be. Look." He pointed to another clock out in the square outside. It read exactly the same: nine o'clock.

Before Donna could say another word, he was out the door. Without paying, she realized, when she heard the angry shouts of the shop owner behind her. She quickly ran after him, following him around the corner.

"Not making any friends, are you?" she asked when she caught up with him. He walked at a brisk pace, but she could hear the shop owner not far behind, and he seemed to have gathered a few comrades to help him chase them down. "Maybe we should keep moving, yeah?"

He took her hand. "Come on."

They cut through a back alley, and he sonicked the lock on the chain link fence that blocked their path, replacing it when they were through and rushing around the corner, leaving the fuming shop owner and his friends behind.

"The source of that light has got to be somewhere..." he mused as they weaved their way between buildings, coming out into the street.

"Don't you think that if there was some giant celestial body up in the sky that wasn't supposed to be there, someone would notice it at some point?" Donna asked.

"Doubt it," the Doctor said. "Apes tend to be horribly bad at noticing things when it's not convenient to them."

"Who are you calling an ape, spaceman?" Donna snapped.

"Well you are. Just a fact of your evolution. Homo sapiens...you're primates after all. No changing that."

"You're a charmer, aren't you?" He turned to look at her, and he seemed to want to say something, but something else caught his eye just then, and he paused. "What?"

"That," he said, pointing up at the sky. She saw nothing but a rather unnaturally bright sky.

"_What?_" He sighed in exasperation.

"Oh, look, won't you? Really _look._" She strained her sight, trying to see what he was trying to point out to her, but she just couldn't make it out. He rolled his eyes.

"Alright, fine...fine. Hold on a moment." He surprised her then, facing her square on and placing his hands on either side of her face.

"Oi! What are you-"

"Just relax, alright? I need to concentrate."

"But what are you-"

"Letting you see what I see. Close your eyes."

"I'm not-"

"Just close your eyes, will you?" he barked.

"Fine," she huffed, and she did as she was told, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, letting herself relax.

She felt the unnatural and unfamiliar sensation of someone prodding around in her mind, taking over her thoughts. She resisted at first, but his presence in her mind was no unpleasant or painful, so she was able to relax a bit after a moment, letting him take over. Suddenly, she could see, but her eyes were not her own; she was seeing what he was seeing: her own face, her eyes closed, his hands on either side of her head.

Everything was so vibrant, so colorful, so _saturated_ that it was as if she'd been seeing in shades of gray for her whole life and was just now seeing color for the first time. When he focused on the sky above them, she couldn't help but gasp.

It was a crack. A tear in the sky itself, stretching across her field of vision, flooding everything with bright light.

He took his hands from her, and she staggered a bit as his presence receded from her mind. "What was that?" she asked, holding herself up against a lamp post.

"A wound in the skin of the universe," the Doctor said darkly.

"From what?"

He was silent; he worked his jaw back and forth uneasily.

"Doctor?"

"From a war," he finally said with a sigh.

"What kind of war?"

"A horrible war." He waited a beat, not waiting for her to speak, but seeming to gather his own will to keep talking himself.

"Aren't they all?" Donna asked during the lull.

"Not like this..." he replied. She could hear the pain in his voice; it was as if she was having a conversation with a man who was stoically resisting unimaginable torture even as he spoke. "My people...all of them...they were locked away in the midst of the war. Unable to ever escape through time or space. All of them...dead."

He looked away as he spoke, and she wanted to reach out to him, but he exuded an air of solitude that seemed to push away anything or anyone that came close, like magnets repelling each other. So she merely stood beside him.

"That's where I came from," he finally said. "From the front lines of that war. It must have been so violent that it wounded time and space itself. That must have been what caused those creatures to mutate the way they did; that crack is overflowing with all kinds of temporal energy" He paused a moment and thought to himself. "It must have been what drew the TARDIS here too. It needs to repair itself after escaping the Time War. Would have come to the first place it found with the energy it needed to recover."

"Is there any way to close it up?"

"A crack that big...it would take a massive amount of power to close it correctly. And doing it incorrectly would be very bad for the universe. Like setting a bone wrong...You'd have to re-break it before you could do anything else, except re-opening that crack would be nearly impossible, and even if it could be done, the results would likely rip the universe apart at the seams."

"So...what?" Donna asked. "Things like this are just going to keep happening?"

"Possibly...eventually the crack should close itself, but there's no telling when that could be. Could take hours. Could take a millennium. There's just no way to know..."

"And you can't do anything about it? You're just going to let it keep pouring out temporal energy or whatever the hell you mentioned for as long as it takes to close?"

"What else do you want me to do?" he asked, turning away from her.

"I can tell you what I _don't_ what you to do," she snapped. "I _don't_ want you to turn your back on this planet. You never have before. How could you do that now?"

"How do you know that?"

"How do you think? I've been looking for you for months. I researched you. You've always been there, all throughout history, like some great defender of the earth..."

"And what about my planet?" he snapped, whirrling around to face her again, his eyes blazing bright blue with anger and pain. "Who was there to defend Gallifrey while my people burned? Why should I save such a little insignificant planet when I couldn't even save my own? When I _destroyed _my own-"

He stopped mid-sentence, his shoulders slumping as something within him seemed to break and bring him back to his senses.

They stood in silence.

"I can't do anything about this...not now...Not without a TARDIS at the very least, though even then..."

"How long will it take?" Donna asked somewhat awkwardly after a few moments' pause. "For your TARDIS to fix itself, I mean?"

"Depends...a few more hours, maybe."

"And it'll be okay? Back in that alley?"

He surprised her, letting out a chuckle. "Nothing can get through those doors. Trust me." He looked over at her, and he noticed her slightly confused expression as she looked at something over his shoulder. "What is it?"

"Oh, it's nothing," she replied off-handedly.

"Donna," said the Doctor, looking her straight in the eye. "Nothing is unimportant right now. Especially when there's a giant crack in time and space above your head, you can't afford to overlook details. What is it?"

"It's just that...that statue over there..." She gestured over to a cathedral across the street. There were three angel statues to the left of the large wooden doors, and two on the right. The third spot where it seemed a statue was meant to be placed, was occupied by an empty pedestal.

"What about it? Which one?"

"On the right...I couldn't sworn there was another statue there, but it's not..."

"Odd," he mused.

She turned around, heading back down the alley to get a better look at the cathedral from a different angle, and she let out a scream of surprise when she rounded the corner and an angel statue was staring her right in the face, teeth bared, ready to pounce.


	4. Chapter 4

**This chapter took a little longer than the others, but I hope you all enjoy it. And please leave a review if you feel so inclined. All of us Time Ladies would really appreciate the feedback. :)**

**This chapter was written with help from MayFairy. :D**

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><p><em>Chapter Four<em>

Donna backed away slowly, her heart pounding as she stared at the terrifying stone figure before her. It was an angel, obviously, but it was anything but angelic; its stone teeth were pointed and bared, his face contorted in a demonic snarl.

She felt the Doctor's solid chest behind her, his hands on her shoulders, stopping her from moving when every instinct in her body told her to turn and run.

"C-creepy statue..." she forced out, trying to calm her shaky voice.

"It's not a statue," the Doctor replied. His tone was low and warning. He slowly pulled her back, away from the angel, never letting her turn from it; they walked backwards down the alley.

He leaned close and whispered: "Don't blink."

"What do you mean don't-" She looked up to question him, but he yelled, shoving her head forward again, forcing her to look at it.

Was it just her...or had that thing moved...closer?

"Don't. Blink." She could feel his chest moving against her back as he took quick, adrenaline-fueled breaths, his heartbeat pounding against her own spine. Even if he wasn't showing it, his body gave him away.

The Doctor was scared. Properly scared.

"If it's not a statue," she said slowly, pushing against him as they continued to move back, never taking their eyes off of the demonic angel, "then what is it?"

"Just keep your eyes fixed on it," he said. After a moment, he seemed to get an idea, and he added, "Do you have a mirror? A makeup mirror or something?"

"I don't know, I..." She felt around in her pockets, not daring to look down to search for it. Finally, her fingers wrapped around the small square of plastic. "Yes, I do...but I don't think now's a good time for a touch-up."

"Wasn't planning on it," he said, taking the make-up mirror from her hands and opening it. "I look horrible in summer colors, anyway." Something in Donna tried to laugh at that, like the tiny part of her that wanted to run in the other direction as fast as her legs could take her thought that if she was going to die, she may as well die laughing. But the more sensible part of her insisted that now was not the time for that, so the sound came out more like a choked sob than a laugh.

"Keep your eyes on it," he instructed. "Right until the last moment, keep your eyes on it. And when I tell you...run."

"Run where?" Donna asked. He didn't reply; when they reached the corner, he thrust her away from him, down the alley to their right.

"_RUN!_" he bellowed again, and she did, giving in to her instincts that had been screaming at her to do so ever since she'd laid eyes on that blasted statue. He was behind her, following at a somewhat slower pace.

He glanced in the mirror, watching the reflection of the alley behind him as he ran. He looked away for just a moment, to see where he was going in the cluttered alley, and when he looked at the reflection again, the angel was there, snarling at him over his shoulder. He looked at it for as long as he could, watching it shrink into the distance as they ran, but he was running blind, unable to see where his feet were taking him. Every time he glanced ahead to see his path, even just for a second, the angel gained on them.

As he watched the angel disappearing again in the mirror, he suddenly felt himself pitching forward, and he cried out as he fell face first into a pile of old cardboard boxes behind some shop. He could practically feel the rush of the angel leaping at him, and he scrambled around to look up at it again.

It was mere inches from his face, its claws almost brushing the lapels of his jacket.

He kept his eyes locked on it as he backed away, and he felt himself being pulled up by another pair of arms. "You're a clumsy bloke, aren't you?" Donna said.

"I told you to run," the Doctor said as they backed away from the angel.

"And you can't even follow your own advice, can you?"

After they'd been walking backward for some time, they stepped out of the alley onto the main road. It was not busy, but several cars did pass by, and there was a small crowd milling about.

"I think we can relax for now," said the Doctor. "It won't come out here with so many people around."

"And what exactly was that thing, anyway?" The Doctor didn't appear to hear her. "Oi! I'm talkin' to you. We just had to run for our lives from a bloody _statue!_ I want an explanation!"

"It's a Weeping Angel," said the Doctor, leading her away from the alley and down the street.

"A what?"

"A Weeping Angel."

"Didn't look like it was weeping to me. Snarling Angel, more like. Bite-your-head-off Angel, maybe. It was a statue, though. How could it have been chasing us?"

"It's only a statue when you're looking at it, when you can see it. The minute you look away..." Cautiously, he looked over his shoulder. There was nothing following them. "They're faster than you'd believe. Can kill you in the blink of an eye if it gets the chance. And the worst part is, they're smart. They can hide out, asleep, hibernating on a planet for years and years, waiting for something to wake them up."

Donna paused, and the Doctor looked back at her. "Something like a crack in the universe?" she offered. The Doctor grinned.

"Now you're getting it," he said, and if she didn't know better, she would have said that he sounded like he was proud of her. His smile faded quickly. "They know where to hide. On cathedrals or in graveyards, where nobody would notice them, where people pass by every day without giving them a second glance. There's no telling how many of them there are around here..."

"What, so you're saying there could be more of those things?" Donna asked in alarm.

"Could be, and they won't be as easy to deal with as those slugs were."

"So...you _will_ help," Donna said softly. The Doctor turned and looked at her. She had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, watching him intently.

"Don't have much of a choice, do I?" he replied, and his voice was more sincere, more tender than it had been before.

"And I suppose you're gonna drag me along too?" she joked as she caught up with him.

"Hey, you're the one that decided to stick around in the first place."

"And where would you be without me, eh?" He grinned again, and she thought for a moment that maybe she was getting through to him after all. But it was then that something occurred to her, something that she hadn't noticed before.

"Hold on..." she said, grasping the Doctor's sleeve. "It's darker now...like twilight. What happened to all that light from before?"

"We must be getting out of the range of that crack," he replied. "It might be starting to close after all."

"And that's a good thing, yeah?"

"Yes and no."

"How is it not? Last time I checked _not_ having a giant crack in the fabric of the universe hangin' over your head seemed to be a pretty good thing."

"As the crack closes, it releases more energy. Energy those Angels can feed on. More of them will be waking up soon if they haven't already."

"So how do we find them?" Donna asked. "How do we tell the regular statues apart from the ones that'll do you in?"

"That's the thing," the Doctor replied somberly. "You can't."

"Then what are we going to DO!" Donna shrieked. "We can't die here, can we? I mean, I met you in the future. Future you! We're able to get out of this because we did!"

"Time doesn't work like that!" the Doctor snapped. "Time can be rewritten."

"But how would that even _work?_ If you die here, then I don't meet you, so I don't come here, so this doesn't happen, so you don't die-"

"Less talking, more running!" he paused. "Wait. I'm not looking at the angel. And neither are you."

"So it's not chasing us anymore, yeah? That's good, right?"

"So what is it doing?" he sprinted off, Donna trailing behind him. "See, the thing is, they don't kill you, exactly."

"So why are we running from it? Will it just tear our arms off, or something?" she asked sarcastically, panting from the exercise. "Is there always this much running?"

"When I said it wouldn't kill you exactly, I didn't say you wouldn't die." he slowed down, motioning her to do the same. "It will be hunting for prey, so it'll look for crowds, but it won't want to be seen, so it'll look for distracted people, people looking somewhere else...People looking...Hey, are you listening?"

"Doctor..." she said.

"What?"

She gestured over the tree line at a cluster of lights not far off. The Doctor raised an eyebrow.

"What? What is it?"

Donna rolled her eyes and gestured again, more harshly this time. "Look!"

He followed her gaze again, and his eyebrows shot up as he finally understood. "Oh..." he breathed. "_Oh!_ Oh, you're _brilliant,_ Donna!" He reached out and took her hand. "Come on then!"

"More of the running, then, is it?" she griped, but she followed him none the less.

* * *

><p>"Come on!"<p>

"Where are you taking me?"

"Just come on!"

Two teenagers cut through the crowds surrounding the shimmering Eiffel Tower, the young man leading his girlfriend by the hand around one of the structure's metal legs. They giggled loudly, wide smiles on their faces. Finally, they reached the elevator, and they paused. The girl surveyed the orange cones and cautionary signs with disappointment written on her face.

"I think it's out of order," she said. But that didn't stop her boyfriend; he was already glancing over his shoulder and pushing the caution tape out of the way. "Jimmy, it's out of order. What are you doing?"

"We'll take the stairs, come on!" he called in a hushed tone. The metal stairs by the elevator twisted around and out of sight, but they too were blocked by yellow and orange signs proclaiming that they were forbidden to enter.

"We're not allowed," she said. "We'll get in trouble."

"I'm going on," he told her, grinning. "Won't you come with me? We'll be the only ones at the top...it'll be romantic!" She rolled her eyes and giggled, watching as he pushed his way under the caution tape and disappeared up the darkened stairs.

He looked back around the corner and saw his girlfriend still waiting by the bottom of the stairs, but he could barely see her in the dark, since this part of the tower was not very well lit at the moment. He would go back to get her if he had to; he was not missing out on this chance for them to have this adventure together. Still, he wanted to make sure that they were truly alone, so before he went back for his girlfriend, he made his way up the stairs a bit further, keeping an eye out for anyone else. He saw nobody as far up on the tower as he could make out, but as he rounded another corner behind the elevator shaft, he stopped dead in his tracks.

Before him was the creepiest-looking statue he'd ever seen. It looked like an angel, but it had big sharp teeth and demonic stone eyes. He started, but then laughed, wondering what that thing was doing there.

"Hey Sarah!" he called, taking a few steps back down the stairs. "You have to see this...there's the weirdest looking statue up here!"

"What's a statue doing up there?" she asked in confusion.

"Dunno," he said, "but it's really-" He turned his gaze back to the statues and started when he realized that there were more than he'd originally noticed. Now there were three. But hadn't there only been one...? And hadn't they been a few more steps up?

"Jimmy?" Sarah called when her boyfriend was silent for several more minutes. "Jimmy!" He didn't reappear, nor did he call in reply, and she began to worry. Cautiously, she made her way up a few steps, but then she felt a hand on her shoulder, and she jumped. Was it the police? Was she going to be arrested for trespassing or something? She turned around, and before her was an old man. His eyes were wide with fear. And why did he look familiar? She'd never seen him before in her life, but that face...those eyes...she felt like she knew him.

"Don't go up there," he said.

"What?" she stammered.

"Don't go up there, Sarah." He took a few steps toward her, putting a hand on her shoulder and pulling her away from the stairs. She staggered backward, nearly tripping on the caution tape that littered the ground.

"How do you know my name?"

"Don't go," he said again, his voice more urgent than ever. "Turn around, go back. Don't go up there."

"But my boyfriend...he..." The man continued to approach her, and she kept backing away until he was between her and the stairs. "Jimmy," she called. "Jimmy, I'm going. I'm not coming up." The old man's eyes flooded with relief, but she didn't notice, because she was already turning and running from the tower.


	5. Chapter 5

**Sorry for the somewhat longer update. Thanks for sticking around. Any feedback you feel like providing would be much appreciated. :)**

**I hope my French translations are correct. Please let me know if there are any glaring errors so I can fix them. _Merci beaucoup! _^^**

**If all goes according to plan, this will be the second to last chapter.**

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><p><em>Chapter Five<em>

"The Eiffel Tower..." Donna mused, staring up at the grand structure that sparkled before her. "THE Eiffel Tower. It's bloody brilliant!"

"It is," the Doctor agreed, though the wonder that was present in Donna's voice was absent in his. "But right now it could be the most dangerous place in the city. All these distracted tourists, the cover of night..." They looked around; it had gotten dark quickly as they'd moved farther away from the crack, and now it was just about as dark as the average night. "It's the perfect hunting ground for a Weeping Angel."

"So how do you kill these things?" Donna asked as they wove through the crowd, keeping a sharp eye out for anything that seemed out of the ordinary. "If they're stone when you look at them, I mean."

"You can't kill a stone," the Doctor pointed out.

"No, but you can smash it, can't you?" To her surprise, he let out a laugh, hearty and deep.

"That's true," he said. "You've got quite the mind, Donna. I have to admit I like that."

"Flirt on your own time, Spaceman," she quipped. He raised his eyebrows at her, burying his hands in the pockets of his new leather jacket.

"Help! Somebody! Help me!" Both of them looked up, along with several others in the crowd around them, looking around for the source of the terrified cries. With little more than a glance between them, Donna and the Doctor sprinted in the direction of the voice; it didn't take them long to find her. A girl was collapsed on her knees on the cobblestone, clutching her chest as she struggled to breathe through her fear and tears.

The Doctor knelt beside her, prompting her to look up at him. "What's the matter?" he said gravely, his gaze intense. "What's happened?"

"I...It's Jimmy...I don't know where he's gone...he just..." She broke down into a fit of tears again.

"Is Jimmy your brother?" Donna asked. "Friend? Boyfriend?" Wordlessly, the distraught young woman nodded at the last one. Donna leaned down, whispering in the Doctor's ear, "Do you think it was them?"

"Maybe," he replied.

"And if it was...is he...?" The Doctor looked up at her and shook his head solemnly. Donna pursed her lips.

"What's your name?" the Doctor asked. The crowd around them was growing, and many of the surrounding sightseers were on their cell phones, presumably calling the authorities. In the distance, the Doctor could already hear the approaching sound of sirens; he blocked the distractions out, concentrating on the girl in front of him.

"It's...Sarah..." she choked.

"Sarah..." he repeated with a tenderness that surprised Donna. "Sarah, you have to tell me...what happened? What happened exactly?" Sarah sobbed, putting a hand over her mouth and trying to get ahold of herself. "Sarah, I know it's hard, but it's important. What did you see?"

"I didn't...I didn't see anything," she said shakily. "The elevator was out of order...Jimmy wanted to take the stairs, but they were blocked off...He went up and...and he just disappeared. Said something about a statue and then he was gone..." The Doctor and Donna both shared an alarmed glance at her words, wordlessly coming to the same conclusion.

The Weeping Angels had converged on the Eiffel Tower.

"Sarah," said the Doctor, turning toward her again. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, but Jimmy...he's-" He paused when he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he looked up and saw Donna staring down at him. She silently shook her head, and he sighed.

"He's what?" Sarah prompted.

"He's...missing. But I'm going to try and do what I can to help find him, alright?" The sirens stopped as the ambulance parked nearby, two paramedics making their way through the crowd toward them. The Doctor stood. As the paramedics brushed past them, he and Donna headed for the tower.

* * *

><p>"It's not as charitable as you think, giving her false hope," said the Doctor when they were out of earshot of the girl. "It'll only make it harder for her when she finds out the truth."<p>

"Is it really impossible that he could have survived? Gotten away?" The Doctor turned toward her.

"The Angels don't kill you directly," he explained. "They send you back years in the past. Get touched by a Weeping Angel today and you could wake up in 1920. Same memories, same body, same everything, except there's no getting back. You live your life, waste your years in the past and they feed on the energy of all the time you could have had in the present and future. If Jimmy was the victim of an Angel, and I'm inclined to believe he was, he's either dead or nearly so." He continued toward the Eiffel Tower, Donna close behind.

"And we're going after these things..." she sighed a moment later. He grinned a bit at that.

"Yeah, we are."

Sarah and the paramedics were still attracting a good amount of attention, so the crowds closer to the Tower were slightly more sparse. Donna looked around for something to lead them in the right direction and spotted an elevator that was blocked off, as well as some stairs beside it that led up into darkness. Yellow caution tape littered the ground nearby.

"Doctor," she called. "I think I found it...where that boy disappeared."

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, she said the elevator was out of order, didn't she? That sure looks out of order to me."

"Good eye, Donna. Good eye." He studied the elevator closely, giving it a scan with his sonic.

"_Arrêtez-vous!_" The two of them turned. A security guard was walking toward them briskly, waving them down.

"What's that, then?" Donna asked.

"I think we may be trespassing," said the Doctor.

"_L'ascenseur est fermé. Il est cassé._"

"What'd did he say?" asked Donna, turning toward the Doctor.

"Says the elevator is closed." He turned toward the security guard again. "_Nous le savons. Nous sommes ici pour l'inspecter et faire des réparations._"

"Now what are you saying?" The Doctor did not reply; instead he pressed a finger to his lips and gestured for her to be quiet and wait a moment. She looked at him indignantly.

"_Les réparations?_" asked the man, not seeming very inclined to believe the Doctor.

"_Oui_," the Doctor said with a smile.

"_Pendant la nuit?_"

"_Oui_," the Doctor repeated, although with a bit less confidence this time.

"_C'est difficile à croire._"

"Ah...well..." He searched his pockets for something for a few moments before turning toward Donna again. "Donna, did you find anything in my pockets? In my old clothes? Anything that looked like an old wallet, perhaps? It would do me a world of good now." Donna looked at him strangely for a moment before seeming to remember something and looking through her own pockets. The Doctor flashed a wide smile at the guard as he waited. Finally, Donna let out a cry of success as she fished a small dark piece of worn leather from her pocket and handed it to him.

"Thanks very much," he said, and he showed it to the guard; inside there was just a blank sheet of paper as far as Donna could tell, but the man's eyebrow arched.

"_C'est vrai_," he said, handing it back to the Doctor. The Doctor thanked him quietly and tucked the paper back into his pocket.

"_Oui...bon. Bonsoir, monsieur_." He tipped his hat to the Doctor, and then to Donna. "_Mademoiselle_." The guard turned and headed back toward the crowd, where the paramedics were leading Sarah toward the ambulance.

"Psychic paper," the Doctor explained. "Shows them whatever I need them to see."

"So we're a pair of night-time repairmen, are we?" Donna asked. The Doctor seemed surprised.

"Oh, so you did understand me?"

"Some of it. I can remember enough of my high school French classes to pick out a word or two. Speaking of which, you speak French?"

"I speak everything." Donna scoffed. "I do!"

"Right...whatever you say. So what are we going to do now that we have the all-clear to inspect this elevator?"

"Inspect it, of course," said the Doctor. He was already heading for the stairs, but something stopped him, and he looked worried as he turned back around to face her again. "Unless...you wanted to stay behind."

"What?"

"Could be dangerous," he said with a shrug. "We were never meant to meet. None of this was meant to happen...the last thing I would want is for you to get hurt." There was undeniable sadness in his voice as he spoke; he had already seen enough of people getting hurt on his account, that was sure. Especially now. Donna straightened her shoulders and walked right up to him, looking him square in the eye.

"Listen, Martian," she said, poking him in the chest. "I came looking for you. Maybe you're not the Doctor I was looking for, but I found you anyway. And I'm not just gonna waltz away now. You hear me?" He paused, looking surprised, but when her gaze didn't falter, he broke into a wide grin.

"Well then..." he said, taking her hand. "Fantastic!"

* * *

><p>The lighting was dim on the stairs as they climbed, and the lights had a tendency to flicker. Still, they proceeded, keeping a sharp eye out for any Angels. There were none, and they were getting rather high up. Donna was starting to think that the beasts had found a better hunting ground.<p>

As they turned the corner, Donna paused, catching her breath as she held onto the railing.

"I never should have cancelled my gym membership," she huffed. The Doctor smirked. "Don't look at me like that. We can't all have the body of a marathon runner, can we?"

"Do I?" he asked, looking genuinely surprised. "I hadn't noticed."

"Oh don't get cheeky."

"I'm not!" he said, seeming hurt by her comments. "I haven't been in this body long, after all. Haven't had much time to give it a proper once-over. Frankly, I'm surprised I've gotten the controls down this quick."

"Controls...you make it sound like your life is a flight simulator."

"It's not easy getting used to the steering in a new body. You try running around on a pair of legs you've had for all of a few hours! Still, guess a shot of adrenaline is all I needed. Does wonders for the ole' wiring." He tapped his temple with a grin, and Donna cracked a smile of her own.

"Guess so..." she breathed. She leaned on the railing, looking out over the city. The scene before her looked almost biblical, a ring of light encasing a small portion of Paris not too far off from where they were. Outside that ring of unnatural daylight caused by the crack was night, and the city glittered around them. "We haven't had much time for sightseeing...But it really is beautiful. Never thought I'd get the chance to see Paris, me. Saw it plenty on the History Channel and all, but it's not quite the same as looking out at it from the bloody Eiffel Tower."

"Nothing's ever quite the same as you imagined it would be when you actually see it...I remember seeing my first supernova. Just a little thing...about fifty years old. You can picture something and learn about it all you like, but when you're standing there, looking right at it..." He breathed deeply and let out a sigh, one that sounded almost cathartic. "There's nothing like it..."

She smiled at him. And that was when the lights flickered, blinked and went dark.


	6. Chapter 6

**Here we are, the final chapter. Thanks for the feedback, everyone. And thanks for everyone at the Registry for helping out and providing ideas. Hope everyone is happy with the finished product. ^^**

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><p><strong><strong>_Chapter Six_

Donna felt the Doctor's grip on her arm, so strong it was almost painful, the second the lights went out. Even in the darkness, she realized that he had pulled her behind him, as if he was shielding her from the shadows themselves. It seemed as though the light had taken with it all sound, and all she could hear was the ringing in her ears that came with total silence. As if the city below them had gone completely quiet.

"Doctor..." she breathed, placing a careful hand on his leather-clad shoulder and feeling him jump slightly under her touch. "Doctor, the lights..."

"Donna, I'm going to need you to trust me," he said slowly. She could hear the fear in his voice.

"Can you see at all?"

"Yes," he said, and she sighed in relief. "But I don't like what I'm seeing."

It seemed the effects of the crack were opposite here of what they had been nearer to it. Inside the range of the energy it was releasing was light, so bright it might as well have been daylight, but outside, here above the city, farther from its reach, it seemed to consume the light of the stars and moon, leaving them shrouded in an eerie, unnatural darkness.

The staircase was covered by shadows in both directions, the range of his sight severely limited, but the Doctor still had the advantage of much better eyesight, and through the darkness he could make out several figures, lurking in the dark. Donna began to shake behind him, but she remained strong; she wasn't panicking. That was good, he told himself. Letting fear get the best of them was the last thing they could do to help themselves.

"They're here, aren't they?" she asked, keeping her voice as steady as she could despite the fact that her fear was evident in it.

"Yes," he said. No use lying to her. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the shadowy figures of the Angels approaching from both sides, and he could just barely keep them all in his field of vision. His eyes were beginning to water.

He blinked.

A second later, the Angels were upon them, snarling at them from just a few feet away. The Doctor lifted his arm, point his sonic screwdriver at the lift cable across from them, and the machinery groaned to life, the car rising slowly.

He grabbed Donna's hand.

"Come on!" he shouted, and he pulled her forward, throwing himself shoulder-first at the loose metal screen that separated them from the elevator shaft. It gave way with a cacophonous clatter, and they fell, feeling the rush of air of the Angels just barely missing them as they passed. They landed with a heavy, painful metallic thud on the roof of the lift car as it accelerated upwards, past the Angels that were still waiting for them on the stairway. The stone creatures snarled menacingly as they passed.

Donna groaned unhappily, clutching her arm as she sat up.

"Are you alright?"

"Not dead," she said through gritted teeth. "Oh, that's gonna hurt in the morning...assuming we make it that far. You could have given me some warning."

"No time for that," the Doctor said as the lift screeched to a halt. He spit out a few angry curses. "No...No, no! Come on!"

"This thing was out of order for a reason, I think," Donna said. "Now what? Don't tell me we escaped those monsters just to get trapped in an elevator shaft."

"We should be safe for now," he said. With a quick application of the sonic screwdriver, he was able to turn on the emergency lights on the exterior of the elevator, and Donna blinked as her sight returned.

The Doctor looked around; they were between levels, it seemed, surrounded by metal on all sides. There was another opening high above their heads. It was reachable if they could manage to climb up, but if Donna had injured her shoulder, it would be more difficult for her. At the very least, they were safe from the Angels for the moment.

Or so he thought.

The lift shuttered mightily, and both of them were nearly knocked off their feet. "Was that you?" Donna asked, though the panic in her voice gave away the fact that she already knew the answer.

Frantically, the Doctor went over to the lift cable box, targeting it with his sonic and trying to get it to move. It wheezed and shuddered, clearly trying to make the climb up the tower, but something was preventing it from moving, like some extra weight that it couldn't handle.

"Come on...come on..." the Doctor chanted. The soft whistle of the sonic was the only sound they could hear for a moment, until there was a loud BANG from below them. The Doctor and Donna both blanched when they realized what was happening.

Something began pounding on the hatch in the roof of the lift car, trying to force it open, and Donan threw herself on it, holding it closed with all her strength and ignoring the pain that shot through her shoulder as she did so.

"Keep that hatch closed, Donna!" the Doctor yelled as he continued trying to get the lift to move.

"What do you think I'm doing?" Donna replied irately. The pounding on the hatch increased in ferocity, to the point where Donna could barely keep her grip on it. The emergency lights flickered dangerously; if they went out, the two of them would be in total darkness again, and then where would they be?

"Doctor!" Donna cried, and just as he did so, the hatch flew open, and she was thrown backwards. A stone hand reached up from inside, frozen in place as she stared, its cold fingers flexed and reaching for her.

The lights flickered again, and the hand was replaced by a face, a pair of frozen, glaring eyes peeking out from inside the hatch. Slowly, with every moment of darkness, the Angels began to climb out of the car, coming toward them. Donna pressed her back against the cold metal of the elevator shaft, staring at the creatures, unable to look away and knowing that she would be dead if she did.

The Doctor's hand was on her arm again as he pulled her away from the hatch and toward him. With his other hand, he gripped the lift cable tightly.

"Donna," he said, not looking at her, but instead watching the Angels. "Do you trust me?"

She stared at him silently for a moment before nodded frantically.

"Yes," she said. And to her surprise, he smiled, taking her arms and placing them around his shoulders.

"Fantastic!"

The whirr of the sonic broke the silence, and suddenly Donna felt the lift give way beneath her. Her arms reflexively locked around the Doctor's shoulders, and she held onto him for dear life as she looked down and watched as the car plummeted down the shaft, taking the Angels with it. It hit the ground several stories down with a mighty metallic crash, and then there was silence. Absolute silence. The two of them hung in space, the Doctor holding them up.

"That's one way to kill a stone," she said. He laughed.

"That it is..." he said.

* * *

><p>"You have some serious upper body strength on you," Donna quipped as the two of them sat on the top level of the tower, looking out at the city below.<p>

"Flirt on your own time, Earth Girl," he quipped. She grinned at him. Luckily, the climb hadn't been a long one, and he'd been running on adrenaline as he'd hoisted the two of them up the lift cable to the top level of the tower. Still, now that the chemical high was beginning to wear off, his arms were starting to hurt.

"Do you think they're dead?" she asked after a pause. "The Angels. It was an awfully long fall..."

"Think so," he said. "Whoever cleans up this mess is probably gonna be wondering why there's a pile of destroyed statues in the rubble."

"Well I don't much feel like staying to explain that, do you?" He grinned at her and shook his head. They fell silent again as the Doctor leaned forward and surveyed the city below.

"See that?" he asked, gesturing at the shrinking ring of light over Paris. "The crack's starting to close. Shouldn't take long to heal now. Then there won't be any more energy causing problems. The people of Paris can go back to eating baguettes and drinking fine champagne before long. Though I think they might stay away from the escargot from a while yet, don't you?"

"I know I will..." Donna sighed. He chuckled.

"Me too," he agreed, and his deep laugh grew loud and hardy. In seconds, it was joined by hers, and the two of them laughed until they were red in the face at the top of the Eiffel Tower.

When they'd calmed down, Donna turned to the Doctor again.

"Is your ship gonna be done repairing soon?" she asked. "Bet you're anxious to get going." There was a sadness in her voice that was mirrored after a moment in his eyes.

"No," he said. "Not yet. I've been running for a long time, me. It's kind of nice to just sit here...enjoy the sights."

"Okay," she said in agreement.

They sat up there in relative silence for several hours, watching the light from the crack fade until it looked like nothing more than a line of very bright stars, a fading scar in the skin of the universe. Before it felt like even close to enough time had passed for it to seem a natural occurrence, the sun began to rise, and it was dawn over Paris.

"Alright, Spaceman," Donna said, standing up and stretching her legs. "I think I'm ready to go. And let's take the stairs this time, yeah?"

"Yeah," the Doctor agreed.

* * *

><p>The Doctor was unable to contain his excitement as they approached the TARDIS. It looked rejuvenated, rested, recovered somehow, and it seemed to smile at them as they approached. The Doctor grinned as he grabbed the handle and inserted the key, pushing on the door expectantly. It creaked open, and he turned to smile at Donna as he went inside.<p>

"Oh..." the Doctor breathed as he took in the sight of his ship. "Oh, you beautiful thing...Oh, just look at this! _Look_ at her, Donna! Isn't she fantastic?" He let out a loud, exuberant laugh as he ran to the console. Donna grinned.

"It's just the same as I remember..." she mused, and she saw the Doctor's face fall. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he said, but she could tell all too easily that he was lying. "What do you say I give you a lift home, hm? Unless you haven't gotten your fill of Paris yet..."

"No..." Donna sighed, slumping over the handrail in exhaustion. "No, I've had enough of the city of lights, thanks."

"Alright then...let's run her in, then, eh?" He smirked as he tinkered with the controls; despite the fact that they'd changed and moved and shifted when the TARDIS had rebuilt herself, he found he knew just how to fly her, just which buttons to push. It was as if she was the same as she'd always been. The familiar sound of the TARDIS engines filled the room, and the Time Rotor glowed a brilliant green as they took off.

When they landed, the Doctor looked up at her, and this time his expression was solemn.

"Here we are," he said. "Home." The word sounded bitter and filled with regret. "Or at least, I'm assuming. Might be good to step outside and double-check, you know. She is pretty new to this form, after all." The TARDIS gave an annoyed grumble, and he patted the console affectionately. Donna made her way to the door, but paused when something crossed her mind. She turned back toward the Doctor.

"And what about you?"

"Oh, I've got the TARDIS," he said. "Don't worry about daft old me." He tried to smile, but it only came out lopsided and sour, his eyes betraying his deep sadness that was roiling in the pit of his stomach. Donna approached him.

"What about what you said?" she asked softly. "About...crossing timelines and paradoxes and all that."

"I'll take care of it," he said cryptically.

"Oh no," Donna insisted. "Don't you do that. Don't go being all mysterious and dark. What are you not telling me?"

"There's a lot of things I'm not telling you, Donna." She rolled her eyes.

"I mean what are you not telling me about _this_? Something's going on, isn't there? What have you got going on in that brain of yours?"

"Donna," he interrupted, holding her wrists and looking her in the eye.. "Listen to me. Time is in flux. Things are always changing, always being re-written. But there are some points you can't mess with. Things that have to happen, that always have to happen. Normally I can see them, tell the difference between the two, but everything is...fuzzy...I can't tell one from the other, and I can't take any chances." He let her go, his tone softening until he was almost whispering to her. "When the universe as fragile as it is right now...I can't risk messing with a fixed point in time...I have to take precautions."

"What are you talking about?" Donna asked. "What kinds of...precautions?" He laughed sadly.

"You met a future version of me. A future version that didn't remember you, right? I have to make sure that happens..."

"Make sure...what? That you don't...remember me?" He said nothing, but his eyes gave her all the answer she needed. "What? You just want to wipe this from your memory? Forget all about it like it never even happened?" She was almost shouting now, but she didn't care. She felt abandoned, insulted even. They'd gone through all that and he wanted to forget about all of it? Just like that?

"Donna, I have to..." he said.

"And what about me? Are you just gonna drop me off and forget about me? Never even see me again?"

"But that's just it!" he said, grabbing her shoulders, a spark of real hope coming to life in his blue eyes. "Don't you see? I _will_ see you again. Because I already have. That's still in my future."

"But time's always changing, right? That's what you said. What if that doesn't happen at all?" He chuckled, genuinely this time.

"Oh...maybe. But time could never forget about you, Donna." Despite herself, she let out a laugh of her own. "Just do me a favor, would you?"

"What's that?"

"Keep looking for me. The future me, I mean."

"You're a pretty hard bloke to find, you know."

"Oh, I don't know...you managed it. Twice, even. And you can again. If I'm very, very lucky..."

She smiled, and regretfully, she went to the doors, opening them and looking outside. They were home, alright. Not on some moon or in ancient Rome, thankfully. She turned toward him again. He looked so sad, so alone standing there by the console.

"Can you do me a favor as well?" she asked. He arched an eyebrow at her.

"Depends what it is," he said.

"You keep looking, too."

"For what?"

"You need someone, Doctor. You shouldn't be travelling all on your own." He paused, considering her words.

"I don't need anyone," he said, his expression hard as he turned toward the console. Donna's smile remained as she sighed.

"Yeah, you do. Just do that for me, Doctor. Can't you?" He pursed his lips, and his shoulders slumped.

Finally, he said, "Alright." She nodded. It was good enough for her. For now anyway.

"I'll see you around," she said. It was so strange, talking like that. Like she was saying goodbye to a friend she would see the next day, rather than not being sure of whether she would ever see him again at all. Still, he nodded back at her, and she stepped off the TARDIS, closing the doors behind her.

The Doctor sighed after she'd left, fingers brushing over the new console. "Activate Program Three dash Forty-Two," he said sadly. The TARDIS hummed her disapproval. "What are you on about? You know I have to. I can't take any chances what with the universe as fragile as it is now." The Time Rotor glowed in a gentle, pulsating rhythm, tendrils of green light beginning to emanate from its center. Still, the TARDIS voiced her concern. The Doctor rolled his eyes.

"I know..." he admitted. "I liked her too...but it has to be this way. Got to be done." He closed his eyes.

The TARDIS surrounded his mind, slowly made her way inside his thoughts and plucked from his memories the Eiffel Tower and the Angels, the snails and the cafe, Sarah and Donna and the crack in the universe. She erased the events, but left one thing untouched: a promise. A tiny thought, left floating aimlessly in his mind of a promise he'd made to nobody in particular to keep travelling, to keep searching, to find somebody who could help him, make him better, keep him from being alone.

The whole process took only a few seconds, and when she was finished, she soothed her Doctor's mind into a light, restorative sleep. He fell backwards, into the jump seat, and he dreamed of Paris.


End file.
